196 THE FLOWER. 



opposite the sepals. These organs altogether are in four whorls 

 of three, not in two of six members ; and the pistil at the centre, 

 of three combined members, is the lil'th and final whorl. 



359. The Barberry family exhibits a similar seeming ante- 

 position, which is more striking on account of a multiplication 

 of the members of the perianth. The calyx is of six sepals in 

 two circles, the corolla of six petals in two circles, the stamens 

 equally six ; and so each petal has a stamen before and a sepal 

 behind it. But. when properly viewed as a trimerous flower with 

 double circles of sepals and petals as well as of stamens, all is 

 symmetrical and normal. Menispermum in the related Moonseed 

 family is in the same case, but the flower is trimerous, as seen 

 in Fi<>\ .'$(>!> : in the male blossom this is obscured in the andne- 



~ 



cium (Fig. 368) by a multiplication of the stamens. 1 The 

 same thing occurs in the perianth and bracts of certain ( 'lusiaceae, 

 in which the members counted as in fours are superposed, and 

 in some of which the double dimerous arrangement with apparent 

 antcposiHon extends through the corolla ; while, in other closely 

 related Mowers, the corolla changes to simply tetrainerous and to 

 alternation with the preceding four sepals. This passes, in the 

 same family and in the allied Ternstnemiaceae, into 



360. Superposition by Spirals, as where live petals are ante- 

 posed to five sepals, by an evident continuation of pentastichous 

 phyllotaxy : and the stamen-clusters of Gordonia Lasianthus 

 are probably in this way brought before the petals. 2 The flower 

 of Camellia is continuously on the spiral plan up to the gynce- 

 cinm ; but upon one which, from the 1 tracts onward, rises from the 

 \ to the I and order or higher, tin-owing the petals of the rosette 

 in a full-double llower into numerous more or less conspicuous 

 vertical ranks. 



361. Anteposition in the Androeeiiim. It is in the andru-cium 

 thai real anteposition is most common, and also most difficult to 

 account for upon any one principle. Doubtless it comes to pass 

 in more than one way. This condition is chiefly noticed when 

 the stamens are definite in number, and mainly in isostemonous 

 and diplostemonous flowers. (324.) 



362. With Isoslemony. Vitis (Fig. 379-381 ). also Khamnus 

 (Fig. 1 1 "). 1 16). and the whole Grape and Buckthorn families of 



1 In Columbine (Aquilegia), multiplication of the stamens in successively 



alternating "nnerous whorls similarly brings the andnrrium into ten ranks; 

 so, -when these stamens in double tl<>wers art- transformed into hollow-spurred 

 petals, these are set one into another in ten vertical ranks. 



'-' Gen. Illustr. ii. t. 140. But the petals alternate with the sepals in the 

 ordinary manner of the (lower, though their strong quincuncial imbrication 

 suggests the spiral arrangement. 



